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Vaccinations

Vaccination is the administration of antigenic material (a vaccine) to stimulate an individual's immune system to develop adaptive immunity to apathogen. Vaccines can prevent or ameliorate morbidity from infection. The effectiveness of vaccination has been widely studied and verified; for example, the influenza vaccine, the HPV vaccine,and the chicken pox vaccine. Vaccination is the most effective method of preventing infectious diseases;widespread immunity due to vaccination is largely responsible for the worldwide eradication of smallpox and the restriction of diseases such as polio, measles, and tetanus from much of the world.

The active agent of a vaccine may be intact but inactivated (non-infective) or attenuated (with reduced infectivity) forms of the causative pathogens, or purified components of the pathogen that have been found to be highly immunogenic (e.g., outer coat proteins of a virus). Toxoids are produced forimmunization against toxin-based diseases, such as the modification of tetanospasmin toxin of tetanus to remove its toxic effect but retain itsimmunogenic effect.